2Jun2014

Do strong people (especially women) inspire fear?

I’ve always felt there was something wrong with the “men fear strong women” claim. I don’t know… it just sounded resentful. Contempt, something like: “so you don’t want to be with me? Yeah? Fuck you!”. And then run alone to your bed and cry.

Today I ran across a very simple and unpretentious text and I will quote what called my attention:

“The flip side of being bright is being opinionated.

The flip side of being analytical is being difficult.

The flip side of being funny is being sarcastic.

The flip side of having moral clarity is being arrogant.

The flip side of being entrepreneurial is being a workaholic.

The flip side of being charismatic is being self-centered.”

I have been married at least twice, had so many relationships that I lost count of, and many of them were significant. I have sweet memories of my lovers. Yet, I chose not to be in a stable relationship for a long time already. Until recently, I still felt a little guilty every time I ran from one. I think about my mom, who worries that there will be nobody to take care of me (mothers think of us as little girls forever).

I suspect many people (not only women, not at all) feel the same way: the world out there is trying to help you find a romantic pair and you just stubbornly refuse to comply. I think it is time to make peace with who we are and the choices we make.

Would I want to be romantically committed to someone like me? Not a chance: who wants a difficult, selfish, self-centered, short-tempered and arrogant person to live with? I don’t. You can have great sex with this person, a great conversation, experience intense feelings, find him (or her) irresistible and unforgettable, and then, conveniently pick up your clothes, your car keys and leave him (her). Wake up the next day comfortably in your own bed, without the risk of running into that “fascinating” person’s dark side.

So that seems to be it. The misogynist discourse that claims strong women emasculate men and, therefore, turn them off, is just shallow and prejudiced. The feminist claim that men fear strong women because they challenge patriarchal stereotypes is mostly equally bullshit. These “strong women” (and strong men!) are incredible, fascinating people, frequently the most admirable you’ll meet in your life. But not someone to build a stable, romantic relationship with. And if you are one, you probably should understand that the choices you made in life, those choices that made you so attractive, fantastic, a role model for your peers and the young, also made you an impossible romantic partner.

Is this bad? Is this sad? Only if you want it to be. If you do a serious soul search, you will probably find that you wouldn’t give up your privacy and the freedom to make all the decisions without negotiating them with anybody. You love the silence of your home at night.

You miss him (or her) sometimes. Sometimes you miss all of them. You would like to go back in time and hug him (or her) once more or maybe make love to him (or her) the whole night again. But it doesn’t go much beyond that and you’ll just move on to the next (short) affair.

That doesn’t mean you don’t love your kids, your siblings, your parents, your friends and your lovers. It just means your priorities don’t include forming couples. Have never included – will never include. You are much more in love with your projects than with any man (or woman) you ever loved, however madly you did.